eGov ePunjab Special Issue

SPECIAL ISSUE - ePUNJAB SUMMIT 2016

SPECIAL FEATURE

EDITORIAL

Digital Punjab

P

unjab, the land of five rivers, has since ages been known as the ‘food bowl’ of the country and popular for its diverse range of cuisine and culture. However, with the Central Government acknowledging the State as the one leading in eGovernance and asking the rest of the states to emulate its model, Punjab has also come to be known as a State that ensures its citizens access various government services in a hassle-free manner.

In fact, a silent revolution of sorts has been sweeping the Punjab administration, making it tech-savvy, citizen-centric, advanced and effective in its day-to-day governance. Today, the State Government is offering a number of services through electronic mode of service delivery.

It has launched many ICT-led initiatives, which reach significant benefits to both citizens and businesses, and also bring transparency and efficiency in the government functioning.

Currently, the focus of all the departments is on backend digitisation, which includes providing computing infrastructure in the field offices, connectivity through Punjab State Wide Area Network, data digitisation, capacity building, et al. Moving beyond mere digitisation of documents in the name of eGovernance, the State is about changing people’s mindset, procedures and the way the government functions.

The framework for eGovernance in Punjab was laid out in 2002. Ever since, it went on to effectively implement eGovernance in fields such as Education, Health, Food and Civil Supplies, which have together translated into an enviable rate of the State’s GDP growth.

With continuous improvements throughout its e-journey in various phases — starting from informative to interactive to transactional to transformational, Punjab has come a long way. In other words, the State is all geared up to make its eGovernance mission a success by aligning with the Government of India’s ambitious “Digital India” programme.

With a view to showcasing its achievements and its unique initiatives, Elets Technomedia, in association with the Government of Punjab, is organising “ePunjab Summit 2016” in Chandigarh on February 26. The Summit will see State’s policymakers, senior government officials from Punjab and outside, and experts in eGovernance converging on one platform to deliberate, discuss and suggest the path for better governance, not just for the State but for the country at large. The meet will also feature various enlightening sessions on Digital India, Smart Cities, eGovernance and mGovernance, Financial Inclusion, Make in India, IT in Education, IT in Health, etc.

We hope this Special Issue of the magazine brings you an over-all view of eGovernance as unfolding in Punjab and elsewhere in the country.

RAVI GUPTA Ravi.Gupta@elets.in

Email at subscription@elets.in to get previous issues

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ASIA’S FIRST MONTHLY MAGAZINE ON E-GOVERNANCE

SPECIAL ISSUE- ePUNJAB 2016

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

COVER STORY

Punjab 2.0

From serpentine queues in dusty government offices and endless wait for government files to move, to swanky SUWIDHA centres, SAANJH centres and swift action on file, where a citizen enjoys efficient service delivery as his right, Punjab has come a long way. The country’s food bowl is now known more for its effective and innovative governance reforms than its verdant fields and sun-kissed ripened wheat, reports Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN) from the land of five rivers

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U

ntil sometime back, Punjab was considered essentially an agrarian state, but steadily it is now wearing a new look and assuming a different identity.

There has been a silent revolution of sorts sweeping its administration that is leaving it more tech-savvy, citizen-centric, advanced and effective in its governance.

This is evident from the fact that the past year alone has seen the central government acknowledge and honour the State for leading in eGovernance and asking the rest of the states to emulate the example it has set. In April 2015, Prime Minister Narendra Modi conferred the “Best Governance Practice” award on the Punjab Government for its “unique citizen-centric initiative to abolish non-statutory affidavits in the state”.

Punjab pipped states, such as Gujarat, Kerala and Karnataka, to win the honour.

The award was received by Punjab Chief Secretary Sarvesh Kaushal at Vigyan Bhavan in New Delhi on the occasion of the 9th Civil Services Day. The portfolio of Governance Reforms has been with the dynamic Deputy Chief Minister, Sukhbir Singh Badal, who has been tirelessly introducing initiatives to engage citizens in governance. “The main focus of these reforms is to restore citizen’s trust in institutions. For this we brought about reforms particularly in police administration, revenue collection agencies and district administration. These reforms have provided dignified and easy access to services for citizens and have made administration transparent and accountable,” says Sukhbir Badal.

In fact, what prompted the change was the fact that even after 63 years of Independence, citizens have to prove their identity; for declarations regarding their profession, income, caste, residence proof, etc., affidavits are to be given on stamp papers and sworn before a magistrate or a public notary.

“We, in Punjab, in 2009 decided to do away with filing of affidavits except in cases where it is mandatory by law. It is encouraging that initiatives like rationalisation of affidavits, introduced by Punjab, have been adopted by the Government of India well,” says the Deputy Chief Minister.

Apart from the government, its agencies, like Punjab Governance Reforms Commission, have been pressed into service and

working towards the cause of welfare of the disadvantaged, marginalised and deprived sections in the State, so as to achieve good governance based on high ethical standards, according to the Chairman of Punjab Governance Reforms Commission (PGRC), Dr Pramod Kumar.

Speaking about various initiatives that the State is taking, Kaushal says, “Punjab, during the last seven years, has emerged as a leading State in eGovernance and has also taken pioneering steps in mobile governance. The prime task before the government is to ensure acceptability of new tools of mobile governance amongst the citizens by focusing on data and financial security.”

The Chief Secretary has been seeking participation of officers at all levels to popularise eGovernance tools, and feels that this can be done by ensuring transparency and quick delivery, besides maintaining the credibility of the system.

“There is a need for the departments to come forward with innovative ideas for effective mobile governance for the benefit of the citizens. In order to build adequate and relevant capacities at all levels, so as to achieve goals of eGovernance and mobile governance, it is important to follow eGovernance Competency Framework,” says Kaushal.

This Framework speaks about bringing India’s eGovernance planning, management and human resource aspects on par with global standards and practices. Since the

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

The main focus of reforms is to restore citizen’s trust in institutions. We brought about reforms particularly in police administration, revenue collection agencies and district administration. These reforms have provided easy access to services for citizens and made administration transparent and accountable.

Sukhbir Singh Badal Deputy Chief Minister, Punjab as the best in the country. The Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY), Government of India, in its quar-

The Central Government has honoured the State for leading in eGovernance. It was conferred with the ‘Best Governance Practice’ award for its ‘unique citizen-centric initiative to abolish nonstatutory affidavits in the State’. Punjab pipped states, such as Gujarat, Kerala and Karnataka, to win the honour purpose of this framework is to enable government departments to “Deploy Right and Develop Right”, there is a need to make use of this framework and deploy right people to implement various eGovernance initiatives.

Punjab Government’s endeavour to make administrative reforms a reality achieved another milestone with the Central Government ranking the State’s eGovernance project

terly ranking released on October 31, 2015 rated the e-District project of the State as the number one such project in the country.

DeitY assessed e-District projects of 36 states and Union Territories for this ranking and had considered several parameters for assessment. While Madhya Pradesh ranked second, Uttar Pradesh was adjudged third in the country. Chandigarh stood at 15th posi-

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tion, Haryana and Delhi shared 11th rank, Himachal Pradesh ranked 14th, while the State of Jammu & Kashmir finished secondlast at 35th position. Bihar remained the laggard at the last 36th position. Punjab’s e-District pilot project had also won Skoch Award and CSI-Nihilent Award for its best implementation last year.

The e-District Punjab project was adjudged as best for its effective pilot project implementation, backend computerisation of maximum number of services among all states, on-time selection of system integrator, delivery of hardware and connectivity in more than 1,000 field offices, robust governance structure in the form of District eGovernance Society, Punjab and other features. After successful launch and operation of pilot implementation in Kapurthala and Shahid Bhagat Singh Nagar, Punjab has now replicated the e-District project across the remaining 20 districts of the State as part of phase-II of project implementation.

Under phase-II of the project, the required IT infrastructure of more than 2,000 desktops, 1,200 network printers, 1,400 scanners and other basic infrastructure have now been provided across 959 locations covering 1,500 government offices at district, tehsil and subtehsil level across 20 non-pilot districts. All these offices have been provided internet connectivity and more than 9,000 officials have been trained as part of capacity building for enabling service delivery under this project.

During the last seven years, Punjab has emerged as a leading State in eGovernance and has also taken pioneering steps in mobile governance.

The prime task before the government is to ensure acceptability of new tools of mobile governance amongst the citizens by focusing on data and financial security.

Sarvesh Kaushal Chief Secretary, Government of Punjab To date, out of the total 42 planned services, a numbers of services have already been made live across the State. As per consolidated

Punjab Land Record Society (PLRS) has been formed by the Department of Revenue with the objective of computerising land records and making these accessible to the citizens.

Fard

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Punjab and Record Society P RS was formed by department of Revenue with the objective of computerizing land records and make these accessible to the citizens. The society has setup 1 3

numbers, approximately 90 per cent of the services have already been made live and are running successfully across the State, and the Punjab Governance Reforms Commission been asked to achieve 100 per cent rollout at the earliest.

Until now, more than 1.3 lakh service requests have been received through e-District application in 20 non-pilot districts and are in various stages of processing. Currently, these services are delivered through Suwidha centres, and in the near future, the same shall be provided across all the counters at Sewa Kendras being established in the State.

Apart from the government, its agencies, like Punjab Governance Reforms Commission, have been pressed into service and are working towards the cause of welfare of the disadvantaged, marginalised and deprived sections in Punjab and achieving good governance based on high ethical standards, says PGRC Chairman Dr Kumar, an eminent social scientist himself.

Only recently, the Commission recommended or 35 per cent reservation for women in government jobs – a decision which is set to have far-reaching implications in upliftment of women in the State, and it has been approved by the State Government. A practical shape to this decision will be given when the government starts filling 1.14 lakh vacant posts in 41 departments. In November last year, the government had announced to start the process to fill the vacant posts, mostly in the school education, water supply and sanitation and agriculture departments. The decision to reserve 35 per cent jobs for women will account for 40,000 of the 1.14 lakh jobs.

Then there are initiatives taken by the Punjab Bureau of Investment Promotion (PBIP) that have been acknowledged by the World Bank in its recent report where it pegged Punjab at 16th position in ease of doing business across India. However, the State topped in the area of setting up of a business, stealing march over other so-called business-friendly states. Punjab scored 81.48 per cent against the national average of 31.91 per cent.

“Remarkably, Punjab is the only State in which the single-window system allows application for all of the licences studied in this assessment, although some others come very close,” the report said.

The “Assessment of State Implementation

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have been one of the key points in governance reforms in the State. Set up in 2012 by the Punjab Government, there are 363 SAANJH Kendras or Police Station Outreach Centres, set up across the State that are now dealing with registration of foreigners, investigation of cases of missing passports, complaints of fraud by travel agents, NRI complaints, tenant verification, registration and investigation of servants, passport verification, police clearance certificate at the time of foreign immigration, apart from other minor clearances.

This means that only heinous crimes such as murder, rape, abduction or drug trafficking are left to be handled by police stations.

The SAANJH, which again is credited to be a brain child of the Deputy Chief Minister, Sukhbir Singh Badal, has been appreciated by the central organisation – Bureau of Police Research and Development, which is now trying to get replicated across the nation due

of Business Reforms Report” for September points out that good practices being followed in the State include setting up of the Punjab Bureau of Investment Promotion by the government that “acts as a unified regulator and provides a one-stop system for all state regulatory and fiscal incentive approvals”. This also means that it functions as a single point of contact for the investors with senior government officials who work as “relationship officers for corporate houses”.

“The Bureau is headed by a chief executive officer empowered by all regulatory departments to provide approvals. Officers on deputation from all regulatory departments work together as part of the single window. Further, to complement the single-window structure, an online workflow-based single window portal helps the investor track approvals in real time,” the report added.

For the past couple of years, police reforms

e-District Punjab project has emerged as the best among all states for its effective implementation, backend computerisation of maximum number of services, delivery of hardware and connectivity in more than 1,000 field offices, robust governance structure in the form of District eGovernance Society, Punjab, etc.

e-Procurement

ro

Technology

P E-

Traditional procurement

mainly paper based

Electronic systems to support traditional procurement

Internet as communication channel to support traditional procurement

e.g. E-mail, websites

e.g. Mainframe, P.C. E.R.P,EDI

Time

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en

em

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Internet tools platforms to replace traditional procurement

Internet tools & platforms to complement traditional procurement.

e.g. fully integrated markets, automatic stock replacement.

e.g. online supplier, databases, ecatalogues, web-enabled EOI

Apart from the government, the Punjab Governance Reforms Commission has been pressed into service for ensuring welfare of the disadvantaged, marginalised and deprived sections in Punjab and achieving good governance based on high ethical standards.

Dr Pramod Kumar Chairman - PGRC, Government of Punjab

to its effectiveness and good governance.

The State already has the honour of being the first in the country to abolish affidavits in 2010, which came as a major relief to residents.

Since then, all other states in the country have been trying to emulate this and implement it. In their efforts, Punjab has been lending a helping hand – providing training and access to government procedures, which allowed this to happen in more than 17 states until now, including Mizoram, Nagalan, Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana.

Punjab has also become one of the few states in the country which has not only notified the Right to Service Act in 2011 but also set up a commission to enforce this. Until July 2013, as many as 1.21 crore people availed services of this Act. Until now 4.36 crore applicants have been provided notified services since the inception of Punjab Right to Service Act. Sixty-six officers have been penalised for causing undue delay in providing services within the notified time lines.

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

Taking eGovernance to Level Next The Punjab Government is providing a wide array of citizen-centric services successfully using ICT, in all parts of the State — urban as well as rural. With core infrastructure in place, the Government has embarked on the second phase of eGovernance initiatives in the State, finds out Arpit Gupta of Elets News Network (ENN)

W

ith a view to giving further push to the digital initiatives in the State, so as to bring more government services to the citizens’ doorsteps, the Government has undertaken several projects in different areas, which are in various stages of implementation. They include:

Agriculture AGRISNET is a mission mode project under National e-Governance Plan of Government of India, Department of Agriculture & Co-

operation. The Ministry of Agriculture has decided to launch a Central Sector Scheme titled ‘Strengthening / Promoting Agricultural Informatics & Communications’ of which one component is AGRISNET. The Department of Agriculture, Punjab has initiated to introduce eGovernance by leveraging ICT to provide agriculture related information or data and to improve upon its functioning in order to bring efficiency, transparency and accountability. The project is currently in the advance stage of finalising Project Consultant.

Broadband connectivity The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has cleared creation of a ‘National Optical Fibre Network’ (NOFN) with an investment of Rs 20, 000 crore that would provide broadband connectivity to all village panchayats in three years.

The Telecom Commission (DoT) decisionmaking arm has approved the project that will be funded through the Universal Service Obligation (USO) Fund. The funding for the broadband network will come from the USO fund; the USO fund has a balance of Rs 16,000 crore.

A World Bank study revealed that a 10 per cent increase in broadband connectivity helps in pushing the GDP growth by 1.4 per cent. Once completed, the optic fibre network will help bring various electronic and Internet-based initiatives of the government to the people living in the remotest corner of the country.

In State of Punjab, NOFN will provide connectivity to more than 12000 Gram Panchayats (GPs) of the State. This would ensure broadband connectivity with adequate bandwidth till the village level. NOFN shall be a 365x24 reliable, robust, scalable and available IP capable network to ensure continuous availability of services. In the first phase connectivity shall be provided to 5000 villages.

NOFN will help the government implement its various eGovernance initiatives such as e-health, e-banking and e-education,

facilitating inclusive growth. NOFN will enable effective and faster implementation of various mission mode e-governance projects as well as delivery of a whole range of electronic services by the private sector to citizens in rural areas.

Online clearance system Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP), Ministry Of Commerce & Industry, Government of India is currently implementing the eBiz Mission Mode Project under the National eGovernance Plan (NeGP) in the country. The project envisions transforming the business environment by providing efficient, convenient, transparent and integrated electronic services online through a single window to the investor, industries and businesses in the areas of information on forms and procedures, licences payments and compliances throughout the life cycle of a business or industry. The core theme of eBiz lies in radical shift in the Government Service Delivery approach, from being department-centric to customer-centric.

Initially 24 services have been offered to various departments in the First Phase of project. The Department of Industrial Policy & Promotion (DIPP), Ministry of Commerce & Industry, is currently implementing the eBiz Mission Mode Project under the National e-Governance Plan

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(NeGP). The Core theme of eBiz lies in radical shift in the Governments’ services delivery approach from being department-centric to customer-centric. Project will facilitate single window delivery of services to investors and businesses throughout the business life cycle.

The DIPP has decided to extend this project to Punjab immediately and currently it is in the initial stage of dialogue.

poor. To improve efficiency and effectiveness of the entire system, the Department of Food & Public Distribution, Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, GoI, has embarked upon an eGovernance initiative involving computerisation of TPDS. For achieving end-to-end Computerisation of

included “Education” as a new MMP. The project is in the initial stage of conception. As a first step in conceptualizing the scheme in the area of Education, the Department of School Education & Literacy initiated the process of consultations with stakeholders for framing Core Scope Document. The core focus of deliverable services to its stakeholders such as students, parents, partners, State Govt. NISG has been selected as a consultant for the preparation of Core Scope Document.

Health

Urban local bodies “eGovernance in Municipalities” is a unique initiative of the government of India conceptualised under the umbrella of the overall National e-Governance Plan (NeGP) aimed at improving operational efficiencies within Urban Local Bodies (ULBs). It has been observed that presently there is very limited or no computerisation across ULBs in different States. There is very limited or non-existent staffs with IT know-how. There is lack of standardisation of processes and processes are primarily operated in a manual mode.

This MMP is one with significant citizen interaction, given that municipalities provide a large number of basic services for millions of citizen living in urban centres across the Nation.

In Punjab, Local Government Department has initiated this project to deliver end-to-end services to its citizens in a citizen-centric way with high levels of accountability and transparency in its service delivery supported by a high degree of efficiency and effectiveness in the department’s internal operations. The project is in the process of selection of implementing agency.

Education NeGP, in its last Apex Committee meeting

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The Apex Committee for the National eGovernance Plan (NeGP) chaired by Cabinet Secretary has approved the inclusion of Health as a Mission Mode Project (MMP) under the NeGP. ICT for programme management has been undertaken by the Ministry of Health & Family Welfare in the Mother and Child Tracking System (MCTS) programme and the Ministry envisages a more comprehensive use of ICT including for Hospital Information Systems, supply chain management for drugs and vaccines, providing ICT tools to ASHA and ANM workers, programme management of National Rural Health Mission (NRHM), etc. through this MMP. The Ministry of Health & Family Welfare is the nodal Ministry

for the design, development and implementation of the MMP. Currently, a study to identify the priorities and scope of the MMP is underway.

Public distribution system (PDS) The Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) is an important social safety net for the

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TPDS, the Department of Food & Public Distribution, Government of India has identified 4 key components which are required to be implemented in all the States/UTs as below: 1. Creation & Management of digitised Beneficiary Database 2. Supply-Chain Management of TPDS commodities from Food Corporation of India (FCI) till Fair Price Shops (FPS) 3. Sale of TPDS commodities at Fair Price Shops including identification and authentication of beneficiaries and recording of transactions.

4. Transparency and Grievance Redressal Mechanism For PDS Punjab is the torch bearer in initiating the Biometric based Authentication Services with Food and Civil Supplies Department established as the state level Authentication User Agency (AUA). Authentication Service Agency (ASA) setup has also been completed.

State is working on the PDS project using this Aadhaar authentication framework through PoS devices at Fair Price Shops to address issues of inefficiency, wastage and pilferage.

The digitisation of Ration Card data has been completed and field verification and seeding of Aadhaar to Ration Cards is being done on ground leveraging technology as well as administrative proficiency.

Current Status: • Data digitisation of approximately 60 Lakhs Ration Card completed • 70 per cent House to House verification done.

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SARVESH KAUSHAL

Benchmarking Good Governance Punjab has been leading the country in governance reforms and has picked up honours for the same down the way. Sarvesh Kaushal, Chief Secretary of the State has been at the helm of affairs of this change and has been instrumental in bringing about the reforms, finds Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN) in an interview with him

H

ow is Punjab implementing innovations in governance reforms?

Punjab has led the way in several ways for other states to emulate in the field of innovations in governance reforms.

We were the first to abolish affidavits in 2010, which was a major residentfriendly measure and we have been helping other states to follow the same.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi in April last year conferred the ‘best governance practice’ award on the Punjab Government for its unique citizen-centric initiative to abolish non-statutory affidavits in the State. Also, last year, Punjab’s eGovernance project was rated as the best in the country. Union Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY), in its quarterly ranking released on October 31, rated the eDistrict project of state as the number one such project in the country.

Other states have been advised by the Centre to replicate the Punjab model of governance reforms.

What has been the State’s driving force?

Our Government has been progressing in its journey towards creating a

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SARVESH KAUSHAL

Punjab has enunciated many initiatives in the ICT sector which will deliver significant benefits to the citizens and businesses. It is our stated vision of pioneering eGovernance initiatives in India that could serve as a benchmark for others to follow knowledge society by harnessing the power of Information and Communication Technology (ICT). To achieve this objective, the State has enunciated many initiatives in the ICT sector which will deliver significant benefits to the citizens and businesses. It will also improve the efficiency of government functioning. It is our stated vision of pioneering eGovernance initiatives in India that serves as a benchmark for others to follow.

Which other projects in governance set the State apart from others?

Punjab

has

been

a

pioneer

in

the eGovernance field with the establishment of the state-of-the-art Suwidha centres in the year 2002 till sub division level. Further, the front end delivery channel established by the Department of Revenue and Department of home is enabling the citizen services of these departments closer to the citizens. Currently, the focus of all the departments of the State is on backend computerisation, which includes providing computing infrastructure in the field offices, connectivity with Punjab Wide Area Network, data digitisation, capacity building, etc. The back end computerisation will pave the way for

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online service delivery to the citizens.

How has this change been made possible to come about?

The effective role played by the State’s eGovernance apex committee to provide guidance and direction to all departments for their e governance programmes has resulted in smooth implementation of eGovernance projects in the State. The enactment of Right to Service Act, Punjab, 2011 for timely delivery of citizen services across the State has infused a fresh thrust to eGovernance programmes of the state.

What has been the response of the people to this kind of governance?

Our citizens appreciate this form of governance as they acknowledge it to be more convenient, resource saving and transparent. With the technological advancements, we will continue to find newer ways to serve our citizens by delivering unified eGovernance experience.

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DR PRAMOD KUMAR

Punjab Governance Reforms Commission works to improve the delivery of services for disadvantaged, marginalised and deprived sections in the State and achieve good governance based on high ethical standards to citizen-centric basic services, tells Dr Kumar, Chairman of Pramod Kumar the Commission, to Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN)

Uplifting Punjab

Public Services

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DR PRAMOD KUMAR

H

The Punjab Governance Reforms Commission helps achieve good governance based on high ethical standards.

ow Punjab Governance Reforms Commission has played an important role in bringing about reforms in the State?

The Punjab Governance Reforms Commission has been set up to improve the welfare of the disadvantaged, marginalised and deprived sections in the State and achieve good governance based on high ethical standards. The motivation coming from the present system of governance is not optimally suited to the challenges of unequal access of social programmes and skewed distribution of benefits of the various economic programmes based on gender, caste and class.

What is the Commission focusses on while suggesting and introducing governance reforms?

The mandate of the Commission is to suggest changes in the processes, procedures, rules, regulations and design of the public services and in respect of the social development programmes, to improve the delivery of services, ensure dignified access of the same to the disadvantaged, marginalised and deprived sections of the society, including women.

The main thrust is to establish the identity of the citizens by changing colonial rules and procedures. Even after 66 years of Independence, in order to prove their identity, the citizens have to seek affirmation from a gazetted officer of the government. There is an urgent need to discontinue such practice and repose greater faith in citizens by accepting self declarations as reliable and authentic documents. This will be a step forward in meeting the trust deficit that annoyingly continues to exist between the citizens and the government.

Punjab has led the country in abolishing affidavits. How successful has this reform been?

The reform has had a huge success and is now being replicated by other states as well. Not only have we trained our own officials, but are providing guidance to several states on how to implement this. Citizens are the direct beneficiaries- there is a saving in monetary terms for getting the affidavits and the opportunity cost of loss of productivity and wages.

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Even after 66 years of Independence, in order to prove their identity, the citizens have to seek affirmation from a gazetted officer of the government.

There is an urgent need to discontinue such practice and repose greater faith in citizens by accepting self-declarations as reliable and authentic documents

by a gazetted officer. The requirement of giving certified copies of documents at the time of admission in colleges or submitting application for recruitment to various posts in the government has been dispensed with.

The citizens have used the money and saved time for more productive ways, which has enhanced their welfare.

What has been the biggest success story of police reforms in Punjab?

How has this reform helped the students and the youngsters?

The requirement of attestation by a gazetted officer from school students seeking admission in various colleges is to be discontinued and replaced with self-attestation. As per data, approximately eight lakh students appear in senior secondary from Punjab School Education Board (PSEB), CBSE and ICSE every year to get admission in colleges. For this, they are required to get their documents duly attested

You have been instrumental in initiating police reforms in Punjab. What has been the aim of these reforms?

The focus of police reforms programme is three-fold institutionalisation of community-oriented reforms with major thrust on involvement of community, particularly to protect the rights of vulnerable sections, formulation of programmes and undertaking activities for improving the delivery of police services to the people. Also, multicultural thrust with an inclusive approach forms an integral part of its justice and policing programme with special focus on gender and scheduled castes rights.

The Saanjh Kendras in Punjab is a model that has come as a breather to people in the State and is being emulated by other states as well. It is a classic example of how citizens’ life can be made easy and people’s involvement in settling grievances can go a long way. The Saanjh Kendras have become a hub for grievance redressal, including those against the police. It has redefined the meaning of community involvement, besides providing services to people in a most friendly manner.

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H S KHANDOLA

e-Projects to Pave

Way for Digital Punjab

Projects like e-District and e-Office ensure seamless connectivity to the citizens of Punjab. H S Khandola, Special Secretary-cumDirector, Department of Governance Reforms, Government of Punjab, informs Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN), how these schemes are making citizens’ lives easier

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H S KHANDOLA

H

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

ow has the State Government been focusing on linking districts?

There has been a lot of focus on implementing the eDistrict project, directly undertaken by the Department of Electronics and Information Technology (DeitY), Government of India. The same is being implemented by the Department of Governance Reforms on their behalf. The project eDistrict envisages integrated and seamless delivery of citizen services by district administration through automation of workflow, backend computerisation, and data digitisation across participating departments. The initiative has provisions for seamless integration of various offices situated at district, sub division, tehsil and block level for providing services to the citizens through a common delivery interface. SUWIDHA centres and Gram SUWIDHA Kendras would be the primary front end channels. In Punjab, eDistrict project has been implemented in two pilot districts of Kapurthala and SBS Nagar with total outlay of `600 lakhs. All the 47 services under the scope of project have been made live in both the pilot districts and more than 2.3 lakh citizen requests have been processed electronically since 2012. Punjab has

2,174 rural CSCs opearte under the brand name ‘Gram Suwidha Kendra’ in Punjab

environment. It was approved by DeitY in 2006-07 and the physical space and basic amenities for setting up SDC is State Government’s responsibility. Currently, the State Government is in the process of identifying the agency to set up a SDC in Mohali.

How has been the progress on eOffice project?

How have Sewa Kendras facilitated lives of the people in villages?

In Punjab, e-District project has been implemented in two pilot districts of Kapurthala and SBS Nagar with total outlay of Rs 600 lakh. All the 47 services under the scope of project have been made live in both the pilot districts and more than 2.3 lakh citizen requests have been processed electronically since 2012 been given four awards so far for implementation of this project.

Punjab has been taking steps to set up State Data Centres. What is the current status?

State Data Centre (SDC) is a project by the Government of India meant for keeping a repository of computing infrastructure, applications and data bases in a secure

of implementation of the eOffice software.

NIC Punjab has already completed the assessment of computing infrastructure of various field offices of the State and has submitted the techno commercial proposal of `41.70 crores. The Mansa district has been selected as a pilot district for the implementation of eOffice Project.

The project eOffice is one on which there is a lot of emphasis and it envisages transforming conventional government offices into more efficient and transparent eOffices, eliminating huge amounts of paper work. We have decided to computerise all the branches of deputy commissioners and the offices of divisional commissioners.

National Informatics Centre (NIC) Punjab has been given the responsibility

The State Government is setting up ‘Sewa Kendras’ kiosks in villages across the State to reach out to common man and enable easy and direct communication with them.

Common Service Centre (CSC) or Sewa Kendras is one of the core ICT-enabled initiatives of the Central Government under its National eGovernance Plan. The Sewa Kendras scheme is predicted to be a bottom-up model for delivery of content, services, information and knowledge to people and organisations for achieving rapid socio-economic change in rural and urban areas of Punjab. To make life more comfortable, the State Government aims to establish and operat 2,174 rural CSCs under the State’s brand name ‘Gram Suwidha Kendra’ in rural, as well as urban areas. These Sewa Kendras have been set up in 10 separate zones to provide transparent, time-bound and affordable Government to Citizen (G2C) services at the rate of one centre per a cluster of six villages.

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ePUNJAB PUNJAB SPECIAL

DR S B DEEPAK KUMAR

Chandigarh Facilitates Citizens via IT French architect Le Corbusier’s legacy, Chandigarh, is known for more than just its beauty and cleanliness. The residents here are pampered with the finest of government services and the use of Information Technology tops the chart. The netsavvy denizens here have a slew of IT services that is making their life easier, tells Dr S B Deepak Kumar, Secretary-IT, UT Administration, to Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN)

PUNJAB 2016 SPECIAL ISSUE / egov.eletsonline.com / egov 22 ePUNJAB

DR S B DEEPAK KUMAR

People in Chandigarh are very net savvy and it has now been made possible to make online payment of taxes, like property tax. We are allowing service providers to share our platform without putting any restrictions on them

C

handigarh has led the way in taking IT initiatives to facilitate citizens.

What are the top initiatives of your Administration?

We have picked up several awards for giving

HIGHLIGHTS l Wi-Fi services in public

areas l Use of computer labs. l People-friendly apps by

UT Police l 205 Common Service

Centres across the city

smooth IT services to people, including the Digital India award. Our most successful and effective venture has been setting up Common Service Centres across the city, about 205, that facilitate the residents in a big way. These have ensured that residents do not have to travel to government offices for their business with the government, but just avail of the services at these centres located at a walking distance from their homes.

Gradually, we are adding more and more services – we already have over 61 services available at these centres in our network, and are tying up with most offices. Most recently, we have tied up with eight post offices and their services too would be available here.

What are the various focus areas of the Administration to promote IT?

ePUNJAB PUNJAB SPECIAL

Digital literacy is a thrust area – we are using school computer labs to educate senior citizens and housewives about use of IT. After school hours, we run computer courses in madrasas. The UT Police has come out with several people-friendly apps.

People in Chandigarh are very net savvy and it has now been made possible to log online for payment of taxes, like property tax. We are allowing service providers to share our platform without putting any restrictions on them. This ensures that the best service provider will sustain and there is no over governance on private players.

Startups are much in talk these days. Do you have any plans to help those as well?

Yes, we are in the process of launching that – space will be provided to startup companies at nominal rates for a period of two years.

Moreover, we will give them the required set up for a spcific time period, so that they can support the upcoming entrepreneurs.

Is there any plan afoot to provide wi-fi service in public areas?

Yes, we have identified popular spots where wi-fi services will be provided. For this, a few places have been identified. These include Sukhna Lake, Sector 17 Plaza, Inter State Bus Stand Sector 43, and railway station, among others.

What is the most ambitious and pet project of the Administration for facilitating work?

The UT Administration is working on Geographic Information System (GIS) mapping of the city and work is about to start on this project very soon. For this, all the departments and wings of the administration and municipal corporation, like public health, power, sewerage, etc. will work in coordination. This will allow us to have a mapping of the various pipes and line networks across the city. For example, if a telecom cable has to be put, we will know, after the mapping, which cables are already in place exactly, before the place is dug up for the cable. Also, it will give us mapping of each and every building in the area that will facilitate us in providing a number of services related to policing, fire services, medical services, traffic management, disaster management, etc. without wastage of time.

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

INITIATIVE

Promoting Good Governance

P

unjab Government is putting the emerging technological innovation like Internet, websites and mobile phones to appropriate use to deliver information about government services to citizens. The State Government is making governmental functioning and process more transparent and accessible upto the grassroot level.

Punjab State Wide Area Network (PAWAN) is a converged fiber network for data, voice and video communications throughout the State. It has a dedicated State-owned fiber network infrastructure to connect government offices at state, district and block levels. It is designed to cater to the governance, information and communica-

The Department of Governance Reforms, Punjab, is entrusted with the task of promoting the portfolio of IT in the State and has undertaken a number of projects that have made life easier for people right up to the village level besides improving work environment in government offices, writes Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN) tion requirements of the entire State. A total of 193 point of presence has been created throughout Punjab, each district and sub division are made into headquarters. The State headquarter has been connected with district head quarter with a bandwidth of 16 Mbps on optical fiber cable, while district headquarter has been connected with subdivision head quarter with bandwidth of 4/2 Mbps.

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PAWAN Cyber Safe The dedicated State-owned network infrastructure PAWAN can be shared by all government departments, boards and corporations. It is a secure closed user group with capability of facing external intrusions and cyber attacks. Once PAWAN is connected with State Data Centre (SDC), it will lead to better integration of services provided by various government depart-

INITIATIVE

to 4 Mbps for district to block head quarters. Also, there will be upgradation of links between district head quarters to block head quarters from copper to optical fibre cable.

There will be connectivity of 139 offices of all departments, boards, corporations and commissions of Punjab Government as also connectivity of 1000-1500 offices under eDistrict state wide roll out project.

Web Suwidha helping citizens Web Suwidha a single user friendly window disposal and helpline for applicants is a proj-

ments besides a huge cost savings due to use of PAWAN hardware at state and district head quarters.

The State will be upgrading vertical bandwidth of PAWAN from 16 Mbps to 24 Mbps for state to district head quarter and 2Mbps

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

and centralised monitoring of citizen service delivery under Web SUWIDHA project. It is implemented as centralised application with centralised database and requires minimum configuration to operate. It is more secure, uniform across the State having facility to generate State level MIS, easy to upgrade with better administrative control.

The data centre hardware for Web SUWIDHA has been installed in temporary state data centre at Mahatma Gandhi State Institute of Public Administration (MGSIPA), Chandigarh and software

The dedicated State-owned network infrastructure PAWAN can be shared by all government departments, boards and corporations. It is a secure closed user group with capability of facing external intrusions and cyber attacks. Once PAWAN is connected with the State Data Centre (SDC), it will lead to better integration of services ect, which has been implemented across the State of Punjab in all 22 districts. The Web enablement of Suwidha software has been done for anywhere access of the application

Fard Kendras help keep the land records computerised making it accessible to the citizens

development has been completed by NIC Punjab. The project has gone live on December 23, 2013.

The project has led to standardisation of outputs and services across all districts. More than 500 citizen services are being delivered through this project. Approximately, three lakh citizen requests per month are being processed through Web SUWIDHA.

Fard Kendras Punjab Land Record Society (PLRS) was formed by department of revenue with the objective of computerising land records and makes these accessible to the citizens.

The society has set up 163 FARD kendras in Public Private Partnership (PPP) to facilitate the citizens to collect their documents across the counter after paying nominal fee.

Records of Rights of about 12780 villages have been computerised. The data of all 22 districts has already been put on the website for public access. Currently, citizens can get the copy of FARD across the counter by paying a very nominal fee on the same counter. PLRS is planning to deliver more land record services through these kendras in future. ePUNJAB 2016 SPECIAL ISSUE / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

RAKESH KUMAR VERMA

Punjab Offices Set to Go Paperless Rakesh Kumar Verma, Secretary, Department of Governance Reforms, has been a driving force behind administrative reforms in Punjab and the State has seen rapid advances in delivering effective citizen services under his efficient leadership, finds Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN) during an interview with him

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RAKESH KUMAR VERMA

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

W

hat have been the most efficient initiatives of Punjab Government in governance reforms that have eased the life of people in the State?

There are multiple such initiatives that the State Government has taken which have meaningfully contributed to people’s lives and gone a long way in making their experience of service delivery a pleasant one.

Punjab was the first to abolish affidavits in 2010 and that came as a major relief to people. Also, effective functioning of Single User Window Disposal Helpline for Applicants, popularly known as Suwidha Centres have taken effective governance right to the village level. An upgradation was made with Web SUWIDHA, implemented in 22 districts, which is web enablement of Suwidha software for anywhere access of the application and centralised monitoring of citizen service delivery under Web Suwidha Project. The Saanjh Kendras, an initiative of Punjab Police that enables the people to easily lodge a complaint or find out its status is another very people-friendly initiative as also is the Fard Kendras, an initiative of the Revenue Department.

What are the key focus areas of the Department of Governance Reforms?

After effective implementation of eDistrict programme, which won the state an award from the Central Government, we are focussing on other initiatives, like electronic office which envisages transforming conventional government offices into more efficient and transparent eOffices, eliminating huge amounts of paper work. In order to provide faster, transparent and efficient services to citizens, we are focusing on ensuring that all government departments focus on computerisation of their back office workflows as soon as possible.

Also, the focus is on Government Process Re-engineering (GPR) which is the most vital element of any eGovernance activity

to eliminate redundant steps to make the ultimate delivery of service faster.

Gateway project is being worked on high priority and aims to achieve a high order of interoperability and facilitate government to citizen services delivery. It would enable How is the government working the citizens to submit their applications towards making eGovernance electronically through a common gateway cost effective?

Many departments in the state are in the and collect the certificate or the service Web of SUWIDH Project has been web-e en ed ather same ss estation. a e It has n abeen in all 22 districts. The from develprocess implementing various enablement of and Suwidha Software has been an ere aso ess e a a n opeddone and for implemented that citizens based applications some of them have centralized monitoring of citizen service delivery under Web Suwidha Project. This replaced the cur client-server technology based software used in Suwidha Centers. The project has been impleme as en ra ed a a n en ra ed da a ase and re uires minimum configuratio operate. It is re se re n r a r ss e s a e, having facility to generate a e e e ,e to upgrade with better administrative control.

After effective implementation of e-District programme, we are focusing onThe other initiatives like electronic data center hardware for Web-SUWIDH has beenoffice installed inwhich Temporary State Data Cente MGSIP , Chandigarh and software development has been completed

by IC Punjab. The Project envisages transforming conventional government gone live on 23rd December 2013. offices into more efficient and transparent This project has lead to andard sa n s and ser es across all districts. re an e-offices, of paper work en er eliminating es ser es huge are beingamounts delivered through this project. pproximately

en re es s er n are being processed through Web Suwidha. also created their own infrastructure, while are provided with outlets where they can some are planning to create the same. As access the services under a single interface per National eGovernance Programme mechanism in the form of the portal. scheme, the State has created common infrastructure like PAWAN, State Data What are the services provided Centre and Gram Suwidha Scheme with through the State Service central funding. We are trying to ensure Delivery Gateway? that these resources are used instead of All departments are giving services under creating parallel infrastructure. Also, this project – one can get name added efforts are being made to strengthen and in birth or death certificate, a disability upgrade common infrastructure instead of certificate, a new ration card, a job card spending money on new infrastructure. under MNREGA, get a marriageability certificate, register marriage under Hindu Marriage Act, post matriculation How is the Government aiming scholarship to OBC students, a caste cerat facilitating government to Directorate e-Governance in Punjabcertificate tificate, residential andofaGovernment slew of Reforms, Pu citizen (G2C) services?

The State Portal and State Service Delivery other services.

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

INITIATIVE

Citizen Centric Policing

SAANJH centres, a novel initiative of Punjab Police, aims to provide services to residents in a convenient and effective manner. The integrated model involves more and more people in redressing grievances, including those against the police force itself, writes Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN)

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INITIATIVE

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

SAANJH Kendras FEATURES l A state-wide IT platform with centralised server at police headquarters linked to every SAANJH Kendra enables centralised data uploading and access providing citizens with copies of FIRs, untraced reports, No Objection Certificates, etc., at a click of a button, in a time-bound frame. l Every SAANJH Kendra provides all services to be delivered by the police department as enshrined in the Right to Service Act within

G

ave your accommodation out to a new tenant, or hired a new servant? If you are in Punjab then you don’t have to spend endless time in dusty corridors of police stations or queue up for a long time to register the same with the police.

Residents have the facility of just walking down to the SAANJH Kendras, neat swanky buildings, in their respective areas and get the needful done in no time.

The public-centric project has linked up Punjab police directly with the public through its 41 services. The services include getting copy

prescribed time limits to the people from a single window.

The citizen from any part of the State can to approach the nearest Kendra for obtaining information/services from any police station in the State, including remote locations. l All SAANJH Kendras are registered as self-representative registered societies under the Registration of Societies Act, 1860. l SAANJH Kendras are the platforms for the partnership

of FIR or DDR, tenant or servant verification, service verification, character verification and passport verification under the project where the applicant or complainant gets the services within a specific timeframe through a single window system.

The project was started in 2010 and in the past the kendras have provided services to more than 50 lakh people across the State within a span of four years. There are nearly 400 SAANJH Kendras in the State now that are also dealing with registration of foreigners, investigation of cases of missing passports, complaints of fraud by travel agents, NRI complaints, passport verification, police clearance certificate at time of foreign immigration, apart from other minor clearances. Only heinous crimes such as murder, rape, abduction or drug trafficking are left to be handled by police stations.

22 motorcycles for SAANJH Kendras being flagged off

of community and police to plan and implement the locally connected community-centred projects. The members of SAANJH committee and designated experts, like lawyers, counsellors, including women, handle issues relating to children, senior citizens, NRI related controversies and other domestic-social disputes like fast driving, under -age driving, etc.

The centres are self-sustaining, with operating costs, including staff salaries, phone/electricity bills and computer maintenance, compensated by the collection of fees — complainants are charged between `5 and `200 for services offered.

The Bureau of Police Research and Development lauded the tireless efforts of Punjab Government in introducing people-friendly services through SAANJH Kendras. The bureau in its report tabled in 2015 to the Central Government appreciated the eGovernance initiatives and community policing of the government.

According to the report, “Remarkably, Punjab is the only State, in which the singlewindow system allows application for all of the licenses studied in this assessment, although some others come very close.”

Speaking about the initiative, Deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal said, “More than 31,000 personnel have been working in the Kendras and been imparted training of soft skills to deal with the citizens. It’s heartening to see the people approaching SAANJH Kendras without any hesitation. This has helped to develop a cordial relationship between the police force and public.”

Every SAANJH Kendra is run by a Police Public Committee comprising of Police Officers, Representatives of Government Departments such as health, education, women at the district and sub divisional level and representatives from among principals of colleges, professionals and civil society and NGOs.

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

GOVIND PANDEY

HDFC Woos Punjab with Hi-Tech Banking HDFC Bank focuses on customer convenience and meets the needs of today’s digitallyconscious customers, informs Govind Pandey, Senior Executive Vice President, Branch Banking Head (North), while discussing the banking innovations offered to the State of Punjab with Manish Arora of Elets News Network (ENN)

W

hat sort of banking services does HDFC Bank offer in Punjab?

The Bank offers products ranging from savings account, fixed deposits and current account to two-wheeler, auto and tractor loan, commercial vehicle loan, Kisan gold card, agriculture and commodities loans, international credit and debit cards.

HDFC provides customised solutions for online payment of taxes and fees. It is one of the largest collectors of taxes in the country and enables quick and easy payment of various taxes, including house tax, commercial taxes, and property tax, among others. This apart, it also offers solutions for eProcurement and eTendering.

How do you make your services and applications user friendly?

As people lead a fast paced, busy life, they expect access and convenience from brands, even in the financial services space. Customers, especially the young and the tech-savvy, egov ePUNJAB PUNJAB 2016 SPECIAL ISSUE / egov.eletsonline.com / egov / egov.eletsonline.com / March 2016 30 egov

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

GOVIND PANDEY

A view of the HDFC Bank headquarters in Mumbai

HDFC Bank has a host of new digital banking products, including Chillr, 30-minute paperless auto loan using biometric technology, 10-second personal loan on net banking, PayZapp and instant loans at ATMs work to provide convenience and access to our customers.

What are your views on the Smart Cities concept?

identify the bank they want to be associated with, by looking at the digital banking products and services it offers. Today, various digital banking platforms like Internet banking, mobile banking complement the branches and ATMs to enable customers to do banking transactions at their time and convenience.

In line with this, post the launch of ‘Go Digital’ campaign in 2014, with the ‘Bank aap ki mutthi mein’ offering, HDFC Bank has launched a host of new digital banking products.

These include Chillr, 30 minute paperless auto loan using biometric technology, 10 seconds personal loan on net banking, PayZapp and recently introduced instant loans at ATM.

This is in addition to HDFC Bank’s powerful Netbanking portal and official mobile app, which allows customers to perform over 205 and 85 different types of transactions, respectively.

Adoption of these channels has grown rapidly. More than 60 per cent transactions conducted by HDFC Bank’s customers are performed using Internet and mobile banking channels.

Do you intend to launch any new service in the coming days?

Innovation is at the heart of modern-day banking and technology-led innovation is a major constituent of it. We are constantly at

32 ePUNJAB 2016 SPECIAL ISSUE / egov.eletsonline.com / egov

Smart cities is all about using technology and how it improves daily life and the way services such as power, water, security and governance are delivered. Technology-led banking services like ours will have a big role in these high-tech cities.

What are the mobile services offered by HDFC Bank in Punjab and Haryana?

HDFC Bank offers its powerful Netbanking portal and official Mobile app, which allows customers to perform over 205 and 85 different types of transactions, respectively.

HDFC Bank also offers PayZapp, a payment solution for mobile phone top-ups, instant money transfers, bill payments, groceries, movie tickets, and even big-ticket purchases such as foreign holidays and Chillr, a mobile app that enables instant money transfer to any contact in the phonebook.

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

Er K D CHAUDHARI

Smart Governance Reshaping the Consumer Experience The Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL) was recognised as the best performing power utility in the country by the Central Board of Irrigation and Power in 2015. Er K D Chaudhari, Chairman-cum-Managing Director, PSPCL, informs Manish Arora of Elets News Network (ENN), about various IT initiatives undertaken by the Corporation

W

hat are the various IT initiatives undertaken by the Punjab State Power Corporation Limited (PSPCL)?

PSPCL since its inception in 2010 has invested heavily in IT to provide better services to its consumers and improve internal efficiency.

PSPCL under R-APDRP part-A scheme sponsored by GOI has initiated the use of IT in 47 major towns of Punjab at a cost of `225 cr covering not only DS offices but also Grid Substations.

Under this scheme, offices have been made paperless; Grid sub-stations and distribution transformers are covered under Automated Meter Reading (AMR), thus making 24X7 monitoring of supply a reality. GIS mapping of around 26 lakh consumers has been carried out, thus making possible identification of high loss areas and checking effectiveness of loss reduction schemes.

The facility of making online payments has been introduced under the scheme, thus benefitting the consumers. The billing of new consumers is being done from the next cycle itself which earlier used to take approximately three to four months.

Other miscellaneous jobs like change of name/change of load etc. are being done in a

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Er K D CHAUDHARI

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

time- efficient manner. The complete transparency in the billing procedure has been achieved with the introduction of SAP in PSPCL. All reports are available online to field offices and management for proper monitoring.

AMR for consumers has been started by PSPCL. The billing of all consumers in 47 towns covered under R-APDRP is being done on the same day (1st or 2nd of every month) and their collection is also being received upto 12th of each month, which has reduced the collection cycle.

With the introduction of AMR in PSPCL, human intervention in taking readings has been eliminated which has resulted in saving manpower. The proposal to extend this facility to consumers is also in pipeline.

Tell us something about 1912 complaint registration service.

In order to provide an efficient grievances redressal mechanism to its consumers, PSPCL has launched single number 1912 for complaint registration. The consumer has to call or send an SMS to 1912 to register the complaint.

Each consumer is assigned a unique registration number and registration is confirmed via SMS. The registered complaint is automatically transferred to consumer area nodal complaint centre. After resolution of complaint, the consumer is informed of the same via SMS again.

On closure of complaint, feedback is taken from consumers by third party. Incorrectly closed complaints are reopened by third party.

Consumer also has the option to automatically re-open incorrectly closed complaints by sending SMS to predefined computerised mobile numbers.

The common ePayment System has been developed, tested and implemented by the in-house IT Team of PSPCL. This application stands integrated with two gateways - BillDesk and PAYU. The consumer can select a gateway of his choice. On receiving the payment, the requisite details are in real sync with SAP and emailed to National Institute of Electronics & Information Technology (NIELET), as per their pre-defined schedule. Moreover, this application stands integrated with the outlets getting payment for PSPCL through M/S Billdesk and M/S Basix.

In order to ease the process of consumers in every department,

PSPCL Hall of Fame l PSPCL has been awarded as “Best

Performing Power Utility in the Country” by the Central Board of Irrigation and Power on 1.1.2015. l PSPCL has been rated the top rating of A+

amongst 40 power utilities in the country in the 3rd annual integrated rating of power distribution utilities of India done by the Ministry of Power, Government of India in July 2015. l SkochOrder of Merit Award in 2015

for India’s best Smart Governance for consumer complaint registration and resolution through electricity call centre and nodal complaint centres. l PSPCL’s thermal plant at Lehra Mohabat

has been awarded by the Central Electricity Authority under category of

the government is focusing on single-window system. Any such initiative by PSPCL? PSPCL has introduced a single-window system for new connection/load change application for load 100-500 Kw. This system covers the whole process right from online registration of application up to the release of connection.

This system provides online real time interface with the Government of Punjab for mega projects. Real time status of request is available with consumer through single window and SMS. Multiple bill payment options such as ePayments, Gram Suvidhaa Centers, Easy Bill, Bill payment

“Performance of Thermal Power Stations” for its excellent performance in the year 2013-14. l The plant had also received “Meritorious

Productivity Award” for the years 2011-12 and 2012-13. l PSPCL has bagged four Par-Excellent

and four Excellent Awards in this annual national level convention, where quality circles of various private, public and government sectors from all across India compete every year in national convention NCQC 2015, Chennai, conducted by Quality Circle Forum of India. l PSPCL has bagged three Excellent and

two Distinguished Awards in national convention NCQC 2014, Pune, conducted

by Quality Circle Forum of India.

machines/kiosks etc., are also provided.

People are moving towards an era of mGovernance. Any mGovernance-related initiative

by PSPCL? PSPCL is in process of launching mobile app for its consumers. Facilities like updated status of bills and payments, including online payment facility, registration of applications for new connections, extension/reduction of load, change of name for existing connections, bill challenge, meter challenge, real-time status of supply schedule and power cuts will also be provided on the mobile app.

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ePUNJAB SPECIAL

FEATURE

PUNJAB De-Addiction Centres Raise Hope

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lame it on Punjab’s ‘strategic location’, or failure of successive governments in the State to check the menace, but the worrisome truth is that Punjab is on a constant high. More disturbingly, it is not just a high number of the youth, middle-aged and the elderly, who are in a vice-like grip of intoxication, but increasingly children, as young as eight-years-old, are getting addicted to a plethora of abusive substances available freely in Punjab’s hinterland.

An alarmingly high quantity of drugs, like heroine, is pushed into India from Pakistan via Punjab, which is the main transit route for the drug smugglers. It is reported that the recent terror attack on Pathankot Air Base was conducted by Pakistani terrorists, who entered India using the route that drug smugglers use to pump in narcotics in the State.

Punjab is not just waging a war on the terror front – Pakistan has launched a proxy drug war in the State, targeting the population, primarily the youth. And the worrying part is that

The State of Punjab has traditionally been high on the narcotic drugs smuggled into the State from bordering Pakistan. While the security agencies are playing their part in curbing the trans-border menace, the various drug de-addiction centres are doing exceedingly well in rehabilitating the drug-addiction victims. An in-depth report by Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN)

they are winning this battle big time.

A recent study conducted by the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), New Delhi has revealed that opioids worth `7,500 crore are consumed in Punjab every year. In a survey that is first of its kind, the National Drug Dependence Treatment Centre at AIIMS has reported that more than 1.23 lakh people in Punjab are dependent on heroin. This means that 0.84 per cent, about 2.3 lakh of the entire State’s population, is opioid-dependant, if artificial substances having the same impact on nervous system as opiates, are taken into

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account. The survey reveals that opioiddependent people are spending approximately `20 crore daily on these drugs. On an average, a heroin-dependent individual spends about `1,400 per day.

The State Government, acutely aware of the problem, which has become a political issue in elections, has adopted a multi-pronged strategy to deal with the situation. A high-profile committee of experts from the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research was invited by the Punjab Government to suggest measures to curb the menace.

FEATURE

In all, there are 27 drug de-addiction centres (DDCs) operational in Punjab, and to provide tertiary-level facilities, five model DDCs (50 bedded each) have been set up at Jalandhar, Patiala and Bathinda that will work under Amritsar, Patiala and Faridkot medical colleges

Following this, 27 drug de-addiction centers (DDCs) have been made operational in the State. To provide tertiary level facilities, five Model DDCs (50-bedded each) have been set up at Jalandhar, Patiala and Bathinda and these

drug de-addiction centres will work under Amritsar, Patiala and Faridkot medical colleges.

The 50-bedded Model Drug De-addiction Centres at Amritsar and Faridkot have been made fully functional. Continuing its efforts

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

beyond de-addiction to rehabilitation, the Government of Punjab has approved 21 counseling & rehabilitation centres of 50 beds each, even as the centre at Amritsar is of 100 beds capacity.

As part of the strategy, detailed guidelines have been framed and circulated to run these centres. The State Drug Controller has issued the order for supply of Beupronorphene medicine to only licensed DDCs. A computer programme has also been designed to effectively monitor the inflow of patients.

Before this, Punjab had reported a widespread use of pharmaceutical or synthetic drugs. The Government is struggling to put a number to those addicted to synthetic drugs, as the State’s police are discovering deep-rooted distribution networks of those in the synthetic drugs trade.

Even as security forces are brainstorming on guarding the country’s frontiers, it is the enemy within that Punjab needs to focus on.

It is not just a trickle of terrorists being pushed into the country to wage terror, but an army of addicts — men, youth, children craving for heroine, synthetic drugs and liquor that the Government needs to be really worried about.

Punjab is traditionally known to have a very high population of alcoholics, with liquor addiction considered a household menace, so much so that the women in hundreds of villages in the State, who are prime victims of alcoholism, have taken upon themselves to physically uproot or burn the liquor vends in their villages.

More than a hundred gram panchayats have given affidavits to the State Government not to allow a liquor vend in their village, because it is devastating families and leaving women penniless and helpless victims of domestic violence.

However, the State Government itself is high on the money that liquor sales fetch to the State coffers. Data shows that the revenue from excise and sale of liquor has increased phenomenally over the years. The State Government makes more than `5,500 crore in a year from liquor sales, a figure that was `3,000 crore three years ago. In 2014, in the State’s population of 2.77 crore (2011 census), it left 12.15 liquor bottles a year for each citizen.

With increasing awareness about the threat that intoxication is posing to the State’s future, various strategies are being devised to tackle the situation. This includes a wide network of drug de-addiction centres, cracking down on the drug mafia, besides adopting advanced techniques in treating drug addicts.

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SPECIAL INTERVIEW

PAWAN GARG

SDC Facilitating

Smart Governance Punjab’s State Data Centre (SDC) enables aggregation of IT infrastructure, consolidates citizen services and eGovernance applications, and supports infrastructure to provide efficient electronic delivery of government-to-government (G2G), government-to-citizens (G2C) and government-tobusiness (G2B) services, says Pawan Garg, Senior System Manager – Department of Governance Reforms, Government of Punjab in a conversation with Priya Yadav of Elets News Network (ENN)

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and access control, besides easy dissemination of information to people on government policies and programmes.

unjab has been working on setting up state data centre.

What does the project envisage?

State Data Centre is one of the core infrastructure components of National eGovernance Plan and is being set up across the country under the National eGovernance Plan of Department of Information Technology, GOI. The project was approved for Punjab with total outlay of `5,014 lakh for five years. State Data Centre has been planned to provide key functionalities like central data repository of the State, secure data storage and online delivery of services, citizen information and services portal, state intranet portal, disaster recovery, remote management and service integration. SDC also provides better operation and management control and minimise overall cost of data management, IT resource management, deployment and other costs.

What are the benefits if Punjab gets via SDC? It has led to reduced processing time and waiting time, besides bringing transparency and speed to governance by automating the application process. It also enables cost reduction due to common utilisation of entire IT and non IT infrastructure. It also enables reduced cost of infrastructure creation, monitoring, management for Punjab and its constituent departments, leading to better management of security

What are the plans for Punjab Wide Area Network in the State?

The project was approved for Punjab with total outlay of `5,014 lakh for five years. State Data Centre will provide key functionalities like central data repository of the State, secure data storage and online delivery of services, citizen information and services portal, among others

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It is proposed to provide horizontal connectivity across the State to various departments for implementation of eGovernance projects. Average cost of horizontal connectivity of one department is around `4.5 lakh per office. More than 2000 horizontal offices are being connected with Punjab Wide Area Network under various projects like state-wide roll out of eDistrict, State Service Delivery Gateway and CCTNS project, etc.

What has been Punjab’s progress in the field of BharatNet? This project is one of the most visionary and ambitious projects of the Government. With a determined approach to drive Digital India programme, the Indian Government is planning to discuss the National Optical Fibre Network project with states as it is seeking their participation in this ambitious initiative that aims to offer broadband connectivity across all panchayats in the country. The Bharat Net project proposes broadband connectivity to households under village panchayats and even to government institutions at district level. Punjab is among the few states in the country which has worked aggressively to implement this project in the State.

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

R C HOODA

Wi-Fi Hotpsots Gaining Momentum Wi-Fi hotspots with high-speed Internet access are now available at convenient public locations in Chandigarh, Amritsar and Patiala, as Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) is improving the connectivity across the State, says R C Hooda, Chief General Manager, Punjab Circle, BSNL, in an interview with Manish Arora of Elets News Network (ENN)

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hat are the various services offered by BSNL for Punjab?

In Punjab, BSNL offers all type of telecom services/solutions for all the customer segments. The main services offered are landline, broadband, mobile, FTTH (Fibre to the Home), various value added services, leased line services, Internet leased line. We also provide customised telecom solution as per need for enterprise customers i.e. cloud services, MPLS-VPN, ISDN, EPBAX, Managed IT and hosting services, VSAT .

Our data center solutions enable our clients to empower their business by outsourcing their IT operations in a smart and secure way. It helps clients to concentrate on their core business by taking their critical-managed IT solutions management responsibilities. BSNL Punjab Circle also provides training to engineering/ management students through the state of the art training centers.

What services does BSNL offer for government organisations?

All telecom services for voice and data are being provided by BSNL to government organizations in a step towards the “Digital India”. We have few important government projects implemented in the government department viz:CCTNS Project: For Fast tracking of Crime and the Criminals, online police verification, online FIR, community police service for the benefit of general public.

PAWAN Project: Leased line connectivity under Punjab State Wide Area

Network (PAWAN) has been provided under this project by BSNL. E-Court Project: Various district and session courts are interconnected though VPNoBB services which enables online tracking of cases/judgments.

Jail & Court Project: Various courts and their respective jails are interconnected through leased lines which enable proceedings of criminal cases through Video conferencing service without moving criminals out of jails.

NADRS Project: Department of animal

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husbandry (Punjab Government) accesses the applications through BSNL Broadband connectivity at various civil veterinary dispensaries to update any communicable diseases among cattle’s.

Sarv Shiksha Abhiyan Project: Punjab School Education Board has taken broadband connectivity at about 6000 Govt. High & Senior secondary schools across the state for the benefit of students for computer/internet education.

E-district Project: Department of Governance Reforms, Punjab Govt. has taken broadband

R C HOODA

ePUNJAB SPECIAL

RC Hooda (fourth from right) on the occasion of soft-launch of 4G services in the Punjab Circle of BSNL.

connectivity at about 1000 office locations across the state to provide online services like birth & death certificates, SC/ST certificates, Pension & old age pension etc.

E-Governance Projects: Various RTOs/ DTOs are connected through VPNoBB links for issue/online tracking of RCs.

Can you share some of the best practices implemented by BSNL for improving connectivity across Punjab?

BSNL has already planned for replacing the age-old existing telephone exchanges with the latest Next Generation Network (NGN) technology. In Phase-I, 11(eleven) exchanges have been replaced with NGN technology in Chandigarh, Jalandhar and Amritsar telecom districts by migrating 50000 subscribers in the new technology. In addition to this, 55 more telephone exchanges will be replaced shortly with NGN in phase-II having 1, 50,000 subscribers. It is worthwhile to mention here that this new technology has advanced features for the users like Fixed Mobile convergence, All India Centrex, MMVC (Multi Media Video Conferencing) etc. which is the demand of the day.

BSNL Punjab has installed around 150 towers (2G and 3G) to upgrade and enhance coverage of mobile network in FY 2015-16 and installation of additional 200 (2G and 3G) towers is in process & likely to be completed by end of March 2016. During FY 2016-17, BSNL Punjab has planned to provide additional 400 (2G and 3G) towers to improve the mobile

BSNL Punjab installed around 150 towers (2G and 3G) to upgrade and enhance coverage of mobile network in FY 201516 and installation of additional 200 (2G and 3G) towers is likely to be completed by the end of March this year coverage which will provide uninterrupted high speed data and voice services to our customers in the urban & rural areas. In the recent survey done by TRAI, BSNL has been ranked among best operators as far as quality of service is concerned. On the wireline front, work of laying of optical fibre under NOFN(National Optical Fiber Network presently called BHARATNET) project is going on war footing which will provide Broadband connection to all Gram Panchayats of Punjab. BSNL is also trying hard to lay new copper cable/optical fiber cable upto new upcoming complexes/buildings for providing various telecom services.

BSNL has implemented ERP (Enterprise Resource Planing) to automate the internal processes of organization for efficient and smooth operation.

For up-gradation of billing and provisioning system of Landline, Broadband and Leasedline network, CDR (Call Detailed Record) based system has already been implemented. This has contributed a lot in provisioning of new services (LL & BB etc.), add-on facility and billing, thereby improving customer satisfaction.

Does BSNL intend to launch any new service in Punjab?

Wi-Fi hot spot services are being introduced for providing high speed Internet access at convenient public locations in Chandigarh, Amritsar and Patiala here under called as Wi-Fi hot spots. Installation of hot spots is under process in these cities. Hot Spot Type-A is applicable for public utility services like airports, railway stations, universities and their campus etc. Hot spot type-B is applicable for personal type of services like hotels, private owned institutes, colleges, libraries, universities and their campuses etc. All major cities of Punjab Circle including Chandigarh will be provided Wi-Fi services by BSNL under Hot Spot Type-A category.

BSNL has recently soft launched 4G services at Chandigarh providing internet speed upto 100 MBPS on mobile devices for testing purpose. At present this service is available to its employees. Customers can experience this fast speed service at Sec.34, CSC Chandigarh.

4G services will be offered to public after completion of testing.

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CORPORATE

GAURAV MITTAL

Matchless Payment Systems

New payment avenues for the unbanked and without-card population are vital for the financial ecosystem nowadays, says Gaurav Mittal, Regional Director, South Asia, MatchMove, in conversation with Poulami Chakraborty of Elets News Network (ENN)

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GAURAV MITTAL

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hat role does MatchMove play in the payments systems?

MatchMove Pay is Singapore’s fastest growing technology company, providing innovative enterprise solutions to help businesses increase revenue, user engagement and loyalty through the strategic use of our customisable cloud-based platforms.

In 2014, we launched the MatchMove Wallet, Asia’s first mobile payment card, in partnership with the American Express. The MatchMove Wallet is a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) that enables any major consumer brands, banks, telcos and regional eCommerce sites to easily issue secure mobile payment cards to reach millions of potential shoppers with smartphones in Asia and emerging markets. The platform also supports other major networks like MasterCard, Visa, Union Pay and JCB. MatchMove Pay has been consistently recognised internationally for its outstanding innovation. We defeated a strong line-up of 14 other finalists to emerge as “Top Innovator” in the highly competitive global fintech competition, SWIFT Innotribe Startup Challenge at SIBOS in Boston. The company was also ranked as Singapore’s fastest-growing technology company in Southeast Asia in the Deloitte Technology Fast 500 Asia Pacific in 2013 and also awarded the Red Herring Top 100 Asia and Red Herring 100 Global in 2012.

How has technology helped integrated development in the ecosystem of MatchMove?

Customers who are in the ecosystem of MatchMove are enjoying rapid growth and expansion in their business as the ecosystem is providing them a new payment avenue for the uncarded and unbanked population.

How would you describe your presence in the Indian market, especially with regard to public and private enterprises?

MatchMove’s presence is made possible with the valuable partnership with Yes Bank.

With our integrated end-to-end payment technology and working opportunities via Yes

CORPORATE

Bank, MatchMove is able to provide prepaid cards solutions to various industries such as eCommerce and tourism, among others.

systems to ensure a full and scalable platform, which can be customised easily according to customers’ requirements.

As an online wallet service provider, what challenges do you face from telecom service providers?

The Government of India has announced Digital India — a `2.50 lakh-crore eGovernance initiative for 2015-2019. Can you share your readiness and strategy for this programme?

Evolution of digital technology has created a positive impact and also challenges various industries. Some of the major challenges faced by larger telecom service providers are in terms of time, data and cost.

In this digital era, time is one of the most essential factors for companies launching a new product or service to their customers.

Often, larger telcom service providers have complex legacy architectures and systems which will result in additional time when developing new products or services for their customers.

H e n c e , telecoms are exploring ways to expedite the process by working with reliable partners who can deliver a working product within a shorter time frame; a system that can help to monetise the mountains of data that flow through their networks. With the huge amount of valuable data collected, telcos wanted to make the best out of it to get insights for both business and marketing decisions, controlling cost while being able to deliver latest product to customers. This will happen by developing or subscribing to scalable services with vendors or partners and can definitely help manage future costs, since operators will be able to react rapidly to market changes.

Who are your key market competitors?What strategy do you adopt to keep ahead of your market competitors?

Banks and payment companies like Alibaba are our competitors. We aim to deliver the most updated technology with quality to our customers within a shorter time frame.

This is achieved by our committed staff who are constantly improving our internal

Focusing on one of the most critical themes – Digital Wallet, MatchMove aims to partner with various service providers and banks to bridge the gap between unbanked population and payment services.

Leveraging on MatchMove’s s mobile wallet platform, which is running on secured PCI-DSS Level 1 Version 3.0 platform with numerous enhanced security features, it will drive a new payment avenue for the

uncarded and unbanked population to be able to make online payments. With the convenience of enabling the uncarded and unbanked population to shop and pay online, eCommerce merchants will also benefit from this newly- added revenue.

Could you brief us about MatchMove’s upcoming projects and future moves in the pipeline?

Indian market will be MatchMove’s main focus this year. With India’s population of 1.2 billion and only 250 million bank accounts, there are tremendous opportunities for MatchMove to continue driving mobile payment solutions for the uncharted and unbanked population. Apart from India, MatchMove is also in talks with a few potential partners in Europe and South Africa to seal off partnerships where we can introduce our sophisticated mobile wallet platform to drive a new payment avenue for the uncarded and unbanked population in other parts of the world.

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SPECIAL INTERVIEW

A P HOTA

Accessing Services Anytime, Anywhere In high-tech times, the National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) is making 24x7 banking a reality for common man, offering services to the customers which are technologically advance and secure, A P Hota, MD & CEO, NPCI, says in an interview with Poulami Chakraborty of Elets News Network (ENN)

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ow NPCI is making real-time interoperable payments possible?

What are the different services available for customers to go cashless?

National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is building platforms to facilitate banks offering services to their customers

which are technologically advanced, secure, easy-to-use payment services. Our Immediate Payment Service (IMPS) platform is a part of this design to support 24x7 real-time money transfer service. This service facilitates instant payment from a ‘Payer’ to the ‘Payee’, both for personal remittances and for merchant payments. This 24x7 real time money transfer service supplements the 24x7 ATM networking services that is connected with almost all the ATMs in the country. RuPay domestic card payment network, National

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Automated Clearing House (NACH) and Aadhaar Payments Bridge (APB) are other services, apart from nation-wide Cheque Truncation System (CTS). All these services working in tandem are aimed at building non-cash payment system in the country.

RuPay is perceived as part of Make in India initiative by the Government of India. How fast is it catching up to match global players?

The credit for envisaging a domestic card payment network goes to Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and Indian Banks’ Association (IBA). The idea of a domestic card payment network was floated in RBI Vision docu document of Payment System 2005-2008 and subsequently, the IBA had set up at task impleforce to examine the feasibility of its imple mentation. After NPCI was operational in 2010, the task was given to it. The domestic card scheme got launched in 2012 and in about four years’ time, there are now 222 million RuPay cards accounting for 1/3rd debit card base in the country. The scheme got a boost with adoption of RuPay as the Narendefault card for the Prime Minister Naren dra Modi’s Jan Dhan Yojana.

Over a period of time, RuPay has been perceived as a project in alignment with ‘Make in India’ initiative. Con Considering that within such a short period, more than 550 banks have been empowered to offer card payment services to their customers, which has made paya huge difference to the pay

A P HOTA

SPECIAL INTERVIEW

ment systems in the country.

How is RuPay catering to premium customers? What are the offerings?

There are two variants of RuPay, namely RuPay Classic Debit Card and RuPay Platinum Debit Card. Major banks are now issuing Platinum variant to their premium customers that comes with attractive recurring and activation offers. Complimentary airport lounge access across all the major airports in the country, cash back on utility bills, zero fuel surcharge and concierge facilities, among others. Moreover, RuPay Platinum Debit Card holders are entitled to Personal Accidental Insurance cover of `2 lakhs. Going forward, we are planning to launch more variants to cater the elite need of the niche category.

What is the future of RuPay International Card and when can one expect RuPay Credit Card?

RuPay has global alliance with Discover Financial Services (DFS), which has already started the acceptance of RuPay cards on ATM and POS in 185 countries. RuPay Global card with Discover, Diners & Pulse Network logos is accepted at over 35 million

authorised Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPIs). This multi-channel remittance platform is an emphatic tool to transfer money instantly through mobile, Internet banking, ATMs and bank branches. The underlying concept behind IMPS has been to provide customers “any time, any place” real-time remittance access to meet their various payment needs. Since it makes 24x7 banking a reality for common man, there are no holidays for this service. A *99# service has been launched to take the banking services to every common man across the country. Customers having basic mobile phone can avail banking services by dialling

NPCI payment processing platforms are highly robust and resilient with adequate firewalls and Fraud Risk Management (FRM) tools. The platforms have been certified for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCIDSS) and data security has been ensured POS locations and over 1.66 million ATM locations. We are further strengthening our network capabilities by creating global network alliances with key players, like JCB International Co. Ltd., Japan & Union Pay International Co. Ltd. in China. RuPay Credit card is expected to be launched in June 2016.

How is IMPS and *99# services different from other fund transferring products?

IMPS is empowering customers to transfer money instantly across banks and RBI

*99#. Inter-bank account-to-account fund transfer, balance enquiry, mini-statement, besides host of other services. AlI these can be performed without any requirement of data connectivity.

What are the developments towards Unified Payment Interface (UPI) and Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS) projects?

Unified Payment Interface (UPI) is under development and at a testing stage. It is designed on IMPS platform to perform

“Immediate Collect” transactions seamlessly. It is a secure platform which will enable customers to initiate payment using an identifier i.e. virtual address assigned by the bank. It is slated to launch in April 2016. NPCI has been entrusted by RBI to operate Bharat Bill Payment System (BBPS) as Central Unit. BBPS will provide common-interoperable payment platform addressing the requirement of common man’s bill payment in cash, card, online or through ECS/NACH. Banks & other entities interested in offering bill payment services have applied to become a operating unit with RBI. This operating unit will bring onboard bills for electricity, gas, telephone utility companies to make them a part of BBPS. BBPS is expected to be operational by June 2016. In addition, both unified payment Interface and Bharat Bill Payments System have been designed to deliver convenience to the consumers.

How is NPCI contributing to curb frauds?

NPCI payment processing platforms are highly robust and resilient with adequate firewalls and Fraud Risk Management (FRM) tools. The platforms have been certified for Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCIDSS) and data security has been ensured. The FRM solution provides risk score of each and every transaction and is sent to the banks to determine at their end to decide whether each transaction should be processed or not, based on the degree of the risk score. A good number of reports are also made available to banks as preventive monitoring tools.

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SPECIAL INTERVIEW

RAVI VARANASI

Treading IT Path for Smooth Trading When it comes to technology implementation in the stock market, National Stock Exchange (NSE) is one of the leading stock exchanges, says Ravi Varanasi, Head, Business Development, NSE, in conversation with Poulami Chakraborty of Elets News Network (ENN)

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hat is the role of National Stock Exchange (NSE) in the development of the economy of India.

The stock exchanges are the places where the capital, along with the market space is allocated among the well-performing companies. The allocation of space in the capital market is usually scarce and market usually allocates capital among stakeholders, especially among new-growing sectors and sectors that are performing well in the economy. The basic function of stock exchange is to direct market activity to performing sectors. We have always been ensuring that the infrastructure being provided is the state-of-the-art and best in class. When we started twenty years back, we ensured that top-notch infrastructure is being provided to investors in the market, so that they can act better without minimum difficulties.

Before NSE came into picture in the Indian economy, each state had their own stock exchanges without any statement guarantee and finalities to settlement. We introduced complete electronic trading system and set up our own electronic network in the country. When we came into the picture of Indian economy, the telecommunication sector was not that robust and organised, hence we have to set up our own V-SAT network; besides setting our own dishes so that we can take trading to all parts of the country. In a way, we have taken the market to the investors, instead of expecting the investors to come to the market; which has been one of the biggest changes in the economy.

Another big change that we have tried to bring in till the time the market was run by intermediaries is, to demutualise the market.

Earlier, the market was run and owned by market intermediaries, who also had trad-

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RAVI VARANASI

SPECIAL INTERVIEW

ing rights. Currently, it is run by government institutions and the trading rights have been rendered with market intermediaries. So, we tried to segregate the interests of all the categories, so that the exchange works as a rule-based organisation and these rules are applied to each and every stakeholder.

How has technology been adopted by NSE and what are its outcomes?

Initially, we were a technology company and had set up our own technology ecosystem and operations; besides ensuring that we are constantly upgrading our technology over the period. Since we entered into the market, volumes have significantly exploded because we use a transparent and easy-to-use technology through which each individual investor has been able to reach the exchange through their brokerages.

Recently, we have introduced mobile-based trading through apps, now enabling clients to trade in the market with their mobiles. In fact, about 12 per cent of the total trading happenings are through electronic systems– from terminals, computers and PCs or whatever their mode of trading is.

There are two lakh and fifty thousand terminals installed across the country, besides the fantastic reach we are able to create through Internet and mobile-based trading. Nowadays, much of the trading happens through algorithms. Algorithmic trading has been slowly taking off in the market, with broker’s servers connected in the exchange premise enabling them to react to market dynamics really fast. Also, our computers are capable of processing over 2000 order messages every second.

How do you describe your presence in the Indian market and how does it impact the stock market players?

When it comes to technology and its implementation in the stock market, NSE is one of the leading stock exchanges. We control almost 85 per cent of share market transactions happening through NSE and about 100 per cent of features and transaction derivatives happening through NSE. Since we created a robust technological platform for banks, traders and brokers, the maximum volume of share market transactions

There are two lakh and fifty thousand terminals installed across the country, besides the fantastic reach we are able to create through Internet and mobile-based trading happens through NSE. Our prime focus is to provide our stakeholders with the stateof-the-art robust infrastructure, so that they do not need to worry about whether they will be able to access the market. While doing this, we also tend to ensure that we have a fairly robust clearing and settlement infrastructure. Our risk-management framework is one of the best infrastructures and can compete with any stock market in the world.

How has digitisation in NSE benefitted the economy at large?

Every aspect of National Stock Exchange has been electronified over a period of time, right from shares in 1984 to our communications in the recent times. A lot of work is happening towards Aadhaar, eKYC and similar outlines. In a way, we have been able to eliminate paper completely from the ecosystem of our operations in NSE. Some paper work is still involved, during the time of on-boarding between the broker and the client, to which the Security and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) is seriously looking into for providing some solutions to make it absolutely hassle-free procedure.

Also, we send email and SMS for any transaction happening through broker for any trade

confirmation in the market.

What is the role of SNS and how has it catalysed the growth of business for NSE? We use social media extensively to make people aware of our products and services available in the market. It enables us to reach out to the unmarked boundary of unreached populace of the economy.

Does NSE play any role in financial inclusion?

Of course, it has a major role. We keep conducting workshop for bankers and financial institutions to educate them on the stock market dynamics and aspects which contribute in the growth of stock market.

Initially, when we came to the market, we noticed that the intermediary skills were significantly weak, for which we started standard skill set training programmes to enhance the intermediary skill-sets at par with the global standards. The exams are conducted online and in the last 17 or 18 years, we have reached about 17 lakh people through these programmes. While doing this, we realised that we need to conduct similar kind of training programmes for investors to create the awareness.

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SPECIAL INTERVIEW

MANISHA RAODEO

Fostering Digital Revolution in Banking The spread of digital technologies in banking sector helps the sector grow phenomenally and being a cooperative bank, we are paying extra attention to innovative IT solutions, Manisha Raodeo, CEO, Greater Bombay Co-Operative Bank tells Poulami Chakraborty of Elets News Network (ENN)

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ow efficiently has IT been utilised in your areas of operation?

Unlike other industries, banks and financial institutions rely on gathering, processing, analysing and providing information in order to meet the needs of customers. At Greater Bank, IT plays an important role as it has helped us to deal with the challenges of the new economy. We are the first cooperative bank to offer an E Lobby at all our branches getting us the title of “Raat Din ka Bank”. Technology has allowed us to offer new products and new services to our customers through introduction of multi functional ATMs, biometrics, ECS, cheque truncation systems, NEFT & RTGS, mobile banking etc which are just few examples. IT has been the cornerstone of our banks offerings which aimed at increasing the speed and reliability of banking operations.

What are the new technological innovations which will transform the Indian banking sector?

Mobile banking has created a revolution and offering financial services on digital platform will be the future. Reach of ‘mobile phones’ in the hinterlands of India has created new opportunities to deliver financial

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MANISHA RAODEO

services up to grassroot level. Documents will be processed online, due diligence can be done online and that too transparently and quickly. RBI has been positive in terms of the payments banks, the KYC (know your customer) regime, coupled with the Aadhaar card (IRIS scans and biometric identification) that has created new possibilities not available earlier. The other big area is data analytics—credit underwriting

financial services to the unbanked population of India and enable the last mile reach of government schemes. More than 20 crore accounts have been opened till date and it has been fairly successful in reaching out to the masses. 86 per cent people who have opened PMJDY accounts are first time account holders. Only 45 per cent of these account holders have Aadhaar card numbers linked to their PMJDY accounts to get benefit of Direct

At Greater Bank, IT plays an important role as it has helped us deal with the challenges of the new economy. We are the first cooperative bank to offer an e-Lobby at all our branches getting us the title of ‘Raat Din ka Bank’. IT has been the cornerstone of our banks offerings which aims at increasing the speed and reliability of banking operations mechanisms are going to change quite dramatically in India.

What is your view on PMJDY? How effective has this initiative been with respect to the Indian economy?

PMJDY is no doubt the largest financial inclusion programme of in the world. The objective of this programme is to ensure

transfer from the government and only 18 per cent have RuPay Cards available. Having crossed the first hurdle the challenge now is to ensure regular use of these accounts.

What are the various initiatives undertaken by the Greater Bombay Cooperative Bank in implementing the PMJDY scheme?

SPECIAL INTERVIEW

Our bank with its vintage of over 63 years has always been at the forefront of driving programmes on financial inclusion.

The ‘No Frills account’ introduced by RBI some years ago was one such initiative we have driven and we have more than 5500 accounts under this scheme. Under the PMJDY, PMJJBY and PMSBY we have garnered more than 4800 accounts from our 22 branches in Mumbai, Navi Mumbai and Thane network.

What are the challenges faced while operating in Tier II and Tier III cities?

The coming phase will see a boom of economic activities in Tier II and Tier III cities.

But low customer awareness and low financial literacy pose the biggest challenge for channelising savings into banking in these cities. As regional languages dominate in these locations banks should ensure that their product/service offerings support this on mobile phones and ATMs by increase in usage of vernacular content.

Apart from the government initiatives, what kind of initiatives should be taken by private banks?

Government initiatives alone will not be sufficient. Banks will need to look at a comprehensive digital strategy to understand consumer behavior, build technical capabilities, manage their product portfolio, and re-define their marketing strategies and channel mix to integrate online and offline effectively. The biggest challenge posed today is the last mile reach of cash which needs to be replaced with more and more cashless options to enable inclusion in its real sense.

With increase usage of Internet via smartphones online shopping, virtual cards, e wallets and new banking apps are fast creating the financial awareness. The need now is to create the financial discipline. Measuring and tracking the impact of banking transactions on all dimensions of the economy and society are not simple and direct, but the potential is immense and will continue to grow in the future. Individual consumption, corporate infrastructure investment and government spending contribute to the cause.

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STATE FOCUS

CHHATTISGARH

Chhattisgarh Strives to Become Next ESDM Hub In line with the Government of India’s ‘Make in India’ programme, the Chhattisgarh Government is going to raise an Electronics Manufacturing Cluster over a 70acre piece of land. It is expected to attract an investment of `2,000 crore from the private industrialists and generate about 4,000 employment opportunities, writes Arpit Gupta of Elets News Network (ENN)

C

hhattisgarh will have one of India’s seven greenfield manufacturing clusters in Naya Raipur soon as a part of the Government of India’s ‘Make in India’ mission. Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid the foundation stone of Electronics Manufacturing Cluster during his visit to the modern capital city of Chhattisgarh.

The Electronics Manufacturing Cluster will be set up in an area of 70 acre and is to be developed at an estimated cost of Rs 89.22 crore, including a component the of Centre’s grant of Rs 43.07 crore.

The cluster will have all facilities, such as flatted factories which are high-rise, multi-tenanted developments with common facilities such as passenger and cargo lifts, loading/unloading bays and car parks, tool rooms, warehouse, waste management system, smart service centre, skill development centre and hospital.

The proposed cluster will have facilities for manufacturing of LED Lights, Solar panels, tablets, mobile phones, IT hardware, set-top boxes, and electronics and electrical automotive.

The Chhattisgarh government expects to attract an investment of Rs 2,000 crore from the private industrialists which could generate employment opportunities. About 4,000 youth are likely to get employment in 61 electronics parts units.

As many as 11 investors have already signed memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the state government, proposing an investment to the tune of Rs 940 crores in the upcoming electronic manufacturing

cluster. Among the investors is Jaina Mobiles Industries. Core Incubator-Cum-Accelerator will be established here.

Chief Minister Dr Raman Singh said that setting-up of pollution-free industries in the State is on the priority list of Chhattisgarh Government. It is a major achievement in the direction of establishing pollution-free industries of Non-core sector in Naya Raipur.

The state-run Chhattisgarh State Industrial

the Centre has proposed seven green field manufacturing clusters—in Naya Raipur (Chhattisgarh), Bhopal & Jabalpur (Madhya Pradesh) Bhiwandi (Rajasthan), Adityapur (Jharkhand) Karnool (Andhra Pradesh) and Falta (West Bengal).

As of now, there is minimal presence of ESDM sector in the state. However, with its inherent strengths, the state has immense potential to become an ESDM hub of the country. Chhattisgarh has emerged as a lucrative investment hub among its competing states with sectors like power, mining and minerals, manufacturing, sponge iron and steel, IT/ITes, biotechnology, food processing, etc. becoming key investment drivers and has attracted both domestic and foreign investment over the past few years.

The state is steadily garnering support from the investors, transforming it to a manufacturing and power hub of the country.

Naya Raipur

Development Corporation (CSIDC) would be the nodal agency to implement the project that would be completed over a period of three years.

Notably, under the Make in India initiative,

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Naya Raipur, the new capital city of Chhattisgarh offers a plethora of opportunities for development of industrial infrastructure in the State.

Naya Raipur houses world class amenities like Knowledge Center with university, research and institutional complexes, 18-hole Golf Course, Theme Township, Convention Centre, Shopping Malls and Multiplexes. Naya Raipur provides for an ideal location for development of non-polluting light & service industries in the State. Naya Raipur has around 8000 Hectare land which can potentially be utilized for industrial development.